New US law will give US president emergency control of the Internet

by guestblogger Beardy…

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When I saw this, the FIRST thing I did was check the date… 1-Sept, not 1-Apr…. ok, so it’s not a bad joke… well not that sort anyway…

I *think* I understand the US view on this in this post-911 era (as alluded to by the author), but somehow I have my doubts as to how effective such a plan would be…. Sure, all the tier-1 or root servers for DNS, ICANN and many of the core routers around the globe are directly or indirectly (ie: owned by US govt, US businesses or with parent companies that are US businesses under US govt jurisdiction) controlled assets that the US govt *could* conceivably order around:

(1)…plan that encompasses all aspects of national security, including the participation of the private sector, including critical infrastructure operators and managers;
(2) in the event of an immediate threat to strategic national interests involving compromised Federal Government or United States critical infrastructure information system or network…

Given that the US gov has successfully forced nations (UK, Oz, CA, etc…) with ties through WTO to write into Law even the most draconian legislation (eg: the DMCA complete with the anti-circumvention and anti-reverse-engineering clauses), in theory they may even be able to create so-called “cooperative Acts” passed by the same countries thereby extending the reach of this bill if it passes into Law…. IANAL, but history has shown some disturbing anti-rights scenarios played out against common sense, common decency and even Common Law.

The real questions are;

(1) would any telco infrastructure or ISP be exempt?
(2) if any telcos would be outside the scope of the likely flow-on Laws, could the independent backbones and ISPs provide sufficient of the meat of the Internet to keep it going under what would amount to martial law?

“Americans continue plans to switch off the internet” – The Inquirer
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1531879/americans-continue-plans-switch-internet

“Bill would give president emergency control of Internet” — CNet
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10320096-38.html

Ref: (excerpt from proposed bill)
http://www.politechbot.com/docs/rockefeller.revised.cybersecurity.draft.082709.pdf

Posted in Copyright and Fair Use | 1 Comment »

MPAA/RIAA wants us paying repeatedly to use what we already purchased.

Beardy Says:

I’m not a lawyer(*****), but the last time I checked, the original foundation stone on which copyright law was based was that of “the printed work”. Before anyone arcs-up, I know, music and movies, etc are not “printed works”. However, follow the logic as to why “the printed work” should remain the basis of copyright law and the outrageous claims by the MPAA/RIAA/etc show up for what they really are… blatant grabs for money (which is unlikely to be passed on to the original artist either for that matter…). Nothing like a lawyer in the form of one Steven Metalitz (who represents the likes of the MPAA, etc) to decide to modify consumer rights to bolster the profits of a corporation.

Let’s look at this like “John Q. Citizen” when buying a book, Vinyl LP, cassette or “Red Book Standard” CD (ie: non-DRM-encumbered media). He buys it, takes it home, uses it as many times as he likes until it wears out or he tires of it.

Now consider Metalitz’s statement that he rejects the need “to provide consumers with perpetual access to creative works” that they have already purchased.  If extended to non-DRM-encumbered media, the implication is staggering.  The logical equivalent of Metalitz’s statement in the real world is that at some indeterminate time after purchase, they are reserving the right to come in and remove or destroy the media from your house and walk away without any compensation.

Now, while that statement may sound outrageous, is it any less outrageous than what amounts to digital vandalism that they are promoting ?

DRM is fundamentally evil.
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